Karnataka gets Rs 53-crore central fund for fisheries

The Union Agriculture Ministry has sanctioned a Rs 53-crore project to Karnataka for the implementation of the Integrated Fisheries Development Project (IFDP) over a period of three years, starting from 2008-09. Funds for the project have been sanctioned under the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY).

The project envisages creation of the inland fisheries infrastructure through the upgrade of state-owned fish seed production and rearing farms, strengthening of fish marketing network and development of technologies for enhancement of fish production and dissemination of practices for wider adoption.

The project will be implemented by four agencies — Department of Fisheries, Karnataka Fisheries Development Corporation (KFDC), Mangalore; Karnataka Veterinary, Animal and Fisheries Sciences University, Bidar; Fisheries Research and Information Centre, Hebbal and Inland Fisheries Division, University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore.

For the first year, the Centre has released Rs 13.14 crore to the state fisheries department and another Rs 26 crore has been earmarked for 2009-10. Out of Rs 52.9-crore project cost, Rs 17.5 crore will be used for creation of infrastructure support for fish seed production, Rs 25 crore for strengthening of the marketing network in the state and another Rs 10.3 crore for developing technologies for enhancement of fish production.

“Through this project, we are aiming at fisheries development in a holistic manner, integrating various components needed for reinforcing the sector to function in a sustainable way benefiting the stakeholders at all levels,” Gangadhar Maddikeri, joint director (fisheries) of the state, said.

The project is aimed at enhancing availability of quality fish seed for the state. The current utilisation of rearing space (effective water spread area) for production of fish seed in the select 25 farms is around 48 per cent. With implementation of the project, the effective water spread would get enhanced substantially, he told Business Standard.

Currently, around 150,000 fishermen are actively engaged in inland fishing and marketing in the state. There are 25,884 tanks with a water spread of 293,000 hectares available for stocking fish. In addition to this, there are 74 reservoirs with a water spread area of 227,000 hectares available for stocking fish seed.

Once the project is fully implemented, incremental fish seed available for stocking of water bodies in the state would go up by close to 2.5 times to 174 million fingerlings.

Increased availability of fish seed would result in an additional area of about 100,000 hectares of state’s inland aquatic resources under fisheries development with an anticipated annual incremental fish production of about 82,000 tonnes, a growth of 67 per cent over the current production. In 2007-08, Karnataka produced 122,000 tonnes of inland fish worth Rs 427 crore.

Under this project, it is proposed to set up modern fish marketing kiosks and hygienic fish markets to ensure better prices to fishermen and also enable consumers to access quality fish and products at affordable prices.

The project also involves imparting modern technologies for small-scale aquaculture farms, farming technologies for freshwater prawn and fish and saline/ alkaline soils.